The Cure - Wish (The Mock Remaster)

I had a lengthy presentation prepared for this post, but it was, ultimately, just a lot of wind; a love letter to The Cure. It read as an obsessed fan letter. Not the way I wanted it to sound, at all.

I prefer instead to speak of this album as it was, and how it has fared.

...poorly.

This is not my own commentary. Reading posthumous reviews on this album's merits see it dragged through the mud, or, at least dragged through 'Disintegration''s viewing prism. In fact, any album The Cure dared to release after 1989 was constantly compared to the formidable 'Disintegration', as though the band were somehow saddled with bettering an album that was praised so highly.

That's not an easy task.  Is 'Disintegration' the greatest Cure album? Well... Not really. It is, undoubtedly, incredible. Understand that I do not debate that, in the least. ...but this fan could do without having 'Last Dance' and 'Homesick' (the way the original vinyl was), or even relegating 'Untitled' and 'Prayers for Rain' to their own EP. It brings the album to an incredibly solid 8 tracks. A far more fantastic listen that would give an EP of four other great, though not as grand, songs.

I have no such conditions for some of The Cure's previous and later albums. 'The Head on the Door' is incredibly solid with nary an utterance of fodder. I do feel as though an edited version of 'Push' would have been a better single than 'A Night Like This', but I wouldn't change the album in the least.

'4:13 Dream' is a varied, but incredible, listen that reads like a band reflecting on its own career without playing the hits. It sounds like a commentary track to the band's years of releases. A grand review.

'Faith' is, perhaps, a better measure of The Cure in their dreamiest mode. It's a complete downer without hope; harrowing and spare. A brooding listen that fits the bill more often than any of their other releases when the world is on one's shoulders.

...and that brings us to 'Wish'.

My love for this album cannot be understated. It is faultless. The musicianship is leaps and bounds above their previous work and explores the peaks and troughs of emotions in a way that, dare I say it, 'Disintegration' didn't quite achieve.

'Lovesong' was gorgeous, but 'Friday, I'm in Love' is a complete give-over to joy. 'A Letter to Elise' scrapes the highs of 'Pictures of You' where the latter's true beauty only came to the fore when it was remixed for the video. The excellent 'Disintegration' is bested by several songs: the poetic desperation of 'Open', the chaotic pleading of 'From the Edge of the Deep Green Sea', the complete destruction of 'Cut', or even the quieter, though cathartic 'End'.

Even the glorious 'Fascination Street' is given an upgrade with the giddy 'Doing the Unstuck' where the band don't just gear up for a fun night out, they dance like no one is looking.

Ultimately, each song on 'Wish' also sounds like it belongs together. The stories are more grounded in reality than before, resulting in a much more honest and forward feeling. There aren't any forays into non-sequiturs. No spiders eating anyone; no dour and intentionally poetic sounding epithets like "The shallow drowned lose less than we...". Most of 'Wish' speaks in ways that we speak everyday. Well, except that most of us aren't quite that honest about our emotions.

It's a shame that The Cure's remasters stopped at 'Disintegration'. 'Wish' (or perhaps 'Mixed Up') would have been next in line. It also sold more copies than 'Disintegration', so it would stand to reason that it deserves a new treatment.

Also, the 'Lost Wishes' (which yours truly mailed out for back in the day) need to be brought into the digital world, as the cassette sounds simply terrible. (There is a vinyl of 'Lost Wishes' that was released in Greece which I have never been able to find.)

All I did for the remastering was to bring down the bass and kick up the high end a little. I adjusted the mids to boost some of the background sounds (listen to the string sounds trailing behind the piano that came to the fore in the beginning and instrumental bridge of 'Trust'). It allows for more play in alternate players. With the bass backed off, there is less kick and murmur in various players. I tested this album in 3 car stereos of various quality and preamps, 6 types of headphones (Beats Audios, factory issued Apple earbuds, Shure open backed monitoring headphones...), monitors, stereo speakers... I think this is a more versatile mastering that I was forced to achieve, once again, without the master tapes.

As for the 'Lost Wishes' and 'The Big Hand' that I've tacked on... My apologies. I had to do it all from an old cassette. I spent more time trying to get rid of the warble of the tape than it was really worth. Still, it's at least somewhat listenable compared to my source. Just know that I put hours of love into it to get it as far as I did.

I also dropped in 'Open (Fix Mix)' for good measure. It's not drastically different from the album version, but it has a few nice surprises for those of us who had become (overly) familiar with the original. I gave it a similar treatment to the album masters. Boosting the mid revealed some "ooooh"'s and incidental sounds I hadn't heard before. A small, but entertaining enough moment that seemed good enough to share.

So, with all of the love I can muster for one of my favourite albums... The Cure - Wish. The mock remaster.

Open (Remastered)
High (Remastered)
Apart (Remastered)
From The Edge Of The Deep Green Sea (Remastered)
Wendy Time (Remastered)
Doing The Unstuck (Remastered)
Friday I'm In Love (Remastered)
Trust (Remastered)
A Letter To Elise (Remastered)
Cut (Remastered)
To Wish Impossible Things (Remastered)
End (Remastered)
Uyea Sound (Poorly Remastered)
Cloudberry (Poorly Remastered)
Off To Sleep (Poorly Remastered)
The Three Sisters (Poorly Remastered)
Open (Fix Mix Remastered)
The Big Hand (Instrumental Poorly Remastered)

Talk Talk - Laughing Stock (The Vinyl and CD Mock Remasters)

A short play concerning this post...

Ahem...

Anyone: So, Rand... What is your favourite album?

Rand: Why, Talk Talk's 'Laughing Stock', of course.

THE END

It is categorically true. The album, while praised immensely upon release, was not in the least bit popular. It gained momentum over the years and is often cited by bands as a source of great inspiration. ...and with good reason.

'Laughing Stock' is not the album you put on at a party (unless it's a pity party). It is meant to be sat with, contemplated, dissected... It's music to be swallowed and digested by. Challenging and necessary.

Instead of that oversold Enigma album that seems to inexplicably be in every household's record collection, this should take its place.

The world was lucky enough to see Talk Talk's first four albums receive the remastering treatment, but 'Laughing Stock' was left off. Shunned again, in spite of the fact that most fans have lovingly attached themselves to it. This was a sad moment. The production and cleanliness is astonishing. The months of studio time are time well spent, as one can hear from the alternate versions of several tracks on 'Missing Pieces', the album's sister in obscurity.

The first time I heard the album was on CD. Vinyl, however, is how I came to love it. Those who prefer vinyl, do yourself a favour and buy this on record. The listen is transformative.

'Taphead' and 'Runeii' are so sonically spare, that those high end and low end incidentals bring out dimensions that the CD couldn't duplicate. The near mechanical drums of 'New Grass', easily this gent's favourite song in the world, sounds less compressed and open with its changing velocities more apparent. The diabolical squall of 'After the Flood''s minute and a half of feedback seems even more detached and dissonant. It just sounds more like what I suspect the album should be.

In my attempt to remaster (once again, without the source tapes) I decided not to try and make the album louder. The quiet bits and empty spaces are necessary to be heard properly. Instead, what I tried to do was bring out the bits that I enjoyed from the vinyl that didn't sound as apparent on the CD (which lives in my car). I took a high quality vinyl (24 bit) copy and gave it a little tune up to try and mimic the analogue sounds in the digital world for the vinyl mock remaster. For the CD mock remaster, I tried to open up the top and bottom ends a bit and bring in some of frequencies lost in the digital copies while retaining a similar volume to the original. I, perhaps, tried to make it sound more like the vinyl that I prefer to hear on nice headphones in a dark corner at home.

I also tacked on 'Missing Pieces' to the CD remaster, giving the tracks a feel that I would suspect to hear if I also had it on vinyl.

I do hope you enjoy.

CD Version (MP denotes 'Missing Pieces')

01 Myrrhman (CD Remastered)

02 Ascension Day (CD Remastered)

03 After the Flood (CD Remastered)

04 Taphead (CD Remastered)

05 New Grass (CD Remastered)

06 Runeii (CD Remastered)

07 After the Flood MP (CD Remastered)

08 Myrrhman MP (CD Remastered)

09 New Grass MP (CD Remastered)

10 Stump MP (CD Remastered)

11 Ascension Day MP (CD Remastered)

12 5:09 MP (CD Remastered)

13 Piano MP (CD Remastered)

Vinyl Version

01 Myrrhman (Vinyl Remastered)

02 Ascension Day (Vinyl Remastered)

03 After the Flood (Vinyl Remastered)

04 Taphead (Vinyl Remastered)

05 New Grass (Vinyl Remastered)

06 Runeii (Vinyl Remastered)

Kitchens of Distinction - The Death of Cool (The Mock Remaster)

A thing of beauty... This is the lost classic of the shoegaze era. If any shoegaze album was, and is still, criminally ignored; this is the worst offender. There are several reasons for this, but I postulate that homophobia was chief among them. Take an already obscure genre and throw in an openly gay singer... They just weren't destined to be widely loved.

It's a shame, really. There is so much to love here. Julian Swales' guitar is the underrated gem of this masterpiece. Most shoegaze bands are unfairly compared to My Bloody Valentine, as though they were the standard for shoegaze. This is, of course, completely untrue. The Simpsons didn't write every joke, The Beatles didn't write every song, and MBV didn't influence every shoegaze band.

If you talk to Patrick Fitzgerald, he insists that 'The Death of Cool' was a step in the wrong direction for the band. He insists that it is too similar to their previous album 'Strange Free World' and that they should have gone with a different producer.

That, honestly, breaks my heart, as I don't know where I'd be without this record. I have had to buy the CD several times over as it has been dragged around from player to car to friend's house; lost, found, scratched, rebought... It is almost surely wherever I am, also.

The lyrics are fantastic. KOD's game was operating on a higher plane to their contemporaries. While MBV and Ride were concentrating on their music and forgoing actual lyrics (Rumour has it, MBV actually spent considerable time on lyrics. They remain less than stellar, so I'm not sure if that was time well spent.), KOD spent their time and energy perfecting both. You wouldn't hear such poetically brilliant lines with real world consequences in other albums like "You're breathing this fear just once a year; we suffocate everyday.", "Animal nuzzles up to my shoulder sweats and grunts and pushes me over with its musty mane in my eyes. I'm closed off and protected." or the genius comparisons of burning an old love's belongings with exclamations of "Burn, burn it all!", "Fire! Fire! Fire! Fire!" and declaring the effigy in honour of "John of Arc". These are the words of a band that worked harder on every aspect of it's craft.

It deserves better recognition.

So, here it is... The mock remaster.

I gave this release a little bump along with its associated b-sides. I just opened it up a bit to bring out the sparkliness of the guitars and showcase the busy vocal production. I do hope you enjoy.

Please leave comments and suggestions about what you would fix about this recording.

01 What Happens Now? (Remastered)
02 4 Men (Remastered)
03 On Tooting Broadway Station (Remastered)
04 Breathing Fear (Remastered)
05 Gone World Gone (Remastered)
06 When In Heaven (Remastered)
07 Mad As Snow (Remastered)
08 Smiling (Remastered)
09 Blue Pedal (Remastered)
10 Can't Trust The Waves (Remastered)
11 Skin (Remastered)
12 Air Shifting (Remastered)
13 Goodbye Voyager (Remastered)
14 Don't Come Back (Remastered)
15 Glittery Dust (Remastered)
16 Spacedolphins (Remastered)

Levitation - Need For Not (The Mock Remaster)

This album is quite a doozy. Far ahead of its time. It took elements of shoegaze, psychedelic, and any other genre it saw fit for the groove (goth, metal, the yet to be solidified post-rock) and crammed them into a swirling cloud of fury and beauty that could caress you gently with one hand while gut punching you with the other. In short; it's brilliant.

Welcome back to A-Sides, B-Sides and Seasides.

I pulled this album out during a time when I was learning to master my own tracks. I made the mistake of listening to it through Beats Audio headphones. The headphones are intentionally bass heavy. It was a disastrous and muddy listen. This is in no way commentary on the production or mix of this genius work. When it was released in May of 1992, I doubt that anyone could have known that the loudness war was about to begin; arguably, only a month later with Faith No More's 'Angeldust', another great album that had some unfortunate unintentional consequences. Faith No More couldn't have predicted it would result in bands like Linkin Park and a whole slew of what became the sub-par version of Faith No More's sound that became known as Nu-Metal.

Another byproduct of the release was the subsequent "Loudness War". If you'd like to know more about this, go to the Googles and read until you're blue. I'm not going to write a dissertation here. Let's just skip all of the preaching and going through the five steps of mourning and arrive at the acceptance... It's how we listen to music, now.

Back to the problem, at hand...

About four songs in, I had had enough of listening to the album on my Beats Audios. As a comparison, I plunked on my open back Shure SRH1840's, a nice and incredibly clean set of studio monitoring headphones. I noticed that there was still too much bass. Not having the source tapes, I simply adjusted some levels. I reduced the bass and ran several of the lower bands through some parallel compression. I rolled off the low end at about 38hz. I boosted the mid and widened the stereo a bit. I also brought up the high end and killed some of the highest signal. It resulted in pulling out some of the guitar nuances. Here is a quick video showing a side by side of the first song, 'Against Nature'. I really love the Bickers' guitar and Francolini's drums, especially on the high end. Franco's tom, snare, and intricate cymbal work get a great boost, and the harmonics and intricacies of the guitar really come to the fore.

Let me know what you think. I know there is a bit of white noise here and there. A curse of some of the boosts without the masters. I chucked on a huge chunk of related b-sides with some tweaking, as well.

Here you are; Levitation's 'Need For Not'. The Mock Remaster.

Against Nature (Remastered)

World Around (Remastered)

Hangnail (Remastered)

Resist (Remastered)

Arcs of Light and Dew (Remastered)

Pieces of Mary (Remastered)

Smile (Remastered)

Embedded (Remastered)

Coterie (Remastered)

Nadine (Remastered)

Smile (Coppelia Version Remastered)

Paid In Kind (Remastered)

Rosemary Jones (Remastered)

Firefly (Remastered)

Attached (Remastered)

Bedlam (Remastered)

It's Time (Remastered)

Squirrel (Remastered)

Jay (Remastered)

Usher (Remastered)

Cloud Shine (Remastered)

Mantra (Remastered)

Link available in comments High Quality VBR mp3

On Returning 2017...

Hullo, former fans (or former strangers) of my former blog, also called A-Sides, B-Sides and Seasides.

The last round of this blog was a place to share out music the way that I listened to it. Since I would collect bands to the most intricate of releases, this often meant that when I would bring my music into this wonderful digital world that I would find myself compiling any given band's b-sides into compilations that would read more like full length albums. After about 90 such compilations of nearly complete b-side compilations from bands like Top, Flowered Up, Kitchens of Distinction, Curve, James, The New Fast Automatic Daffodils, Soup Dragons, Trashcan Sinatras, Adorable, The Wendys, The Happy Mondays, and, well, about 80 others... I finally called it a day with a final purge of incomplete collections I had been working on. It was cathartic and great fun. I had a lot of great readers and contributors along the way. An all around great experience.

What does this have to do with this new incarnation?... Simple. I'd like to continue sharing music in the way that I listen to it.  I wanted to do something truly unique this time around instead of just going back to my old default of b-side compilations. So, here's what you will be getting...

Lately, as I work on my own music (shameless plug: a horde of rand) I have been going through some crash courses in music production, especially in finalising mixes and training my ear for mastering. It made me re-evaluate a lot of my own album collections. Given the examples from a few paragraphs up, one could understand that a lot of my old favourites have not been given the remastering treatments some of them so desperately need. This isn't to say that the mixes are bad. They could just do with an update. Some level tweaking, a little compression here and there... They just need some remastering.

As I started using some of these older recordings to practice my mastering skills, I knew it was time to re-open A-Sides, B-Sides and Seasides. I finally have something to share, again.

Considering the fact that I don't have the original reels or masters for any of the releases, none of these are mastered from the source. There are limitations to what I could achieve. I also don't have much interest in the ongoing loudness war where producers keep trying to push the limits of noise within the constraints of digital dynamic range. I only mean to clean up some things that I hear that bring me the kind of listening experience I'd like to get out of the albums I've gotten used to hearing. It has been a new type of catharsis, as I've managed to pick up on sounds I hadn't heard in songs I've heard a million times, bringing my love back for them.

So, here we are... ABCSides is back, and upping its game. I do hope you enjoy these mock remasters. Often, I will try and include b-sides that I have high quality recordings of (FLAC or WAV when possible), I have tried to clean up some vinyl tracks and mp3, but the original recordings often have flaws that I would need the master recordings for to properly fix. If you, the reader, see any notable tracks missing; feel free to send them my way and I'll try to update former posts with appended material. Also, feel free to let me know if there are dynamic mistakes that you pick up on, as this is a learning tool for me.

As the files that I'm working on often break the 1gb mark, I am unable to provide the 32 bit WAV or 24 bit FLAC over the interwebnets (I've even got a few albums that I've mastered in 5.1 that break around 4gb). My apologies that I'm unable to currently provide these far superior files. Perhaps, at a later juncture. HOWEVER! I WILL be providing very high quality mp3 variable bit rate files which will still provide a grand time with good headphones from your mobile device.

THIS IS FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES!!! Most say it, but I can surely claim it. I'm hoping that people who are already familiar with these albums can give me feedback so I can truly hone this craft. I welcome criticism (though, not abuse). I do not own these recordings, and will gladly remove any posts at the artist's request.

Always remember, these are not professional masters. I am using these albums to practice a craft. DO NOT expect perfection. DO expect some joy.

If you were a fan of my former blog; I'm glad to have you back. If you are new; I do hope you'll stay awhile.